Feeling Much Better

We have had a much much better day. Thanks for all of your love and support. I don't think she is teething yet. It doesn't look like any teeth are any where near coming, but I could be wrong. The doctor said her ears look fine. He said that the reason that she is pulling on them is that they are probably itching. Okay. Who knows. I am happy to know that they look fine. My guess for yesterday is that she just had a bad day. We screwed up her schedule pretty bad the day before with the late travelling to HCMC. She has been happy and easy going today, and it has been a busy day for us.

We finally got some of our apointments done today. I feel like we actually moved ourselves closer to being able to come home. We met at 11 am to go to the US Consolate for our first appointment with the CIS. We were there for quite a while, but the interview was a piece of cake. So easy and took only a few minutes once we finally got in. Then we got back in the car to go to the hospital to have Lucy's medical appointment for her visa. It went pretty quickly. She fell asleep in the car on the wa to the hospital and slept all the way until we had to wake her up to be weighted and measured. She cried for about 2 seconds and then was fine.

After the medical, we drove to get the babies visa pictures made. Once again, she fell dead asleep in the car and we had to wake her up to have her picture made. She was fine though. We are going to try and eat at an Italian restaurant for dinner tonight, so I hope it goes okay. We are about to go to the market. Love and miss you all.

Rough Day

Good morning from Vietnam. It is almost 8 am here and miss little and her dad are still snoozing. Yesterday was an interesting day for us. It started out normal. Lucy played all morning and we went to breakfast and she was great. We came back up to our room, fed her again, and loaded her up in the stroller to go and explore in HCMC since we had no appointments yesterday. She did great for several hours. She loves to be out and about and it is fun for Justin and I to get out and see things. I bought her a couple of things and got myself a great dress and skirt.

I knew she was going to be getting hungry, so we go to Highlands Coffee in the Saigon Center. Highlands Coffee is just like a Starbucks. It was really nice to sit and have a diet Coke and they were very helpful in getting us hot water to warm her bottle up in. She scarfed down her bottle and then the fun begins. She took a huge poop. I mean HUGE. I am sitting there wondering where in the world am I going to change her. I take her to the bathroom and of course there is no changing table. The bathroom was really clean and nice, but still. Sara, you saved my butt by telling me about the Skip Hop. I would have never just laid her down somewhere. I take her into the stall, put down the toilet lid, wipe it down with anti-bacterial wipes, and put out her changing pad. She was actually quite cooperative because she needed to stay very still. Also, just so you know, the bathroom stalls in Vietnam are made for very small Vietnamese people. I could barely fit in there, let alone trying to move around to change her diaper. I felt really sorry for the others in there using the restroom. It stunk so badly. Ugh. Anyway, we lived through that.

I go back out to meet Justin and she is getting really fidgety and antsy at this point. We put her back in her stroller and figure she will be happy once we are on the go again. WRONG. She totally lost it in the Saigon Center. I still have no idea what was wrong with her. She had a clean diaper and had just eaten. She was just done. So, we head home. She ends up falling asleep on the walk home, but only for a short little nap.

When she woke up, she was so upset. Inconsolable. This is so hard to watch when they are so upset. She decides she will take another bottle and falls deep asleep. She totally wore herself out by crying so hard. She was very upset for the rest of the night. I am pretty certain that she is fighting an ear infection. Late in the afternoon she started tugging and rubbing her ears. I have antibiotics for her, but we are scheduled for her medical appointment today and I am just going to wait and ask the doctor. She is not running a fever. She slept very restlessly again all night. I am very tired because of it. She was not up crying, she was just all over the place and not peaceful by any stretch of the word. I watched her most of the night and tried to comfort her. I am ready to go to the doctor and start medicine if we need to. We are supposed to have our first appointment with CIS today. WE are waiting on a phone call from Quoc to let us know when we are going. I am so ready to have one of our appointments and get things going.

I hope that today she is feeling better. I know she is tired because she has never stayed in bed uptil 8. I will let you all know how the doctor appointment goes.

We are in HCMC

Hello again. I have some wonderful news. We are in a hotel with an ethernet cable and there should be no internet issues while we are here. What a relief. It is expensive to use, but who really cares at this point? Not me and certainly not Lucy. She wants you guys to know more and more about her.

Yesterday was a wonderful day for little miss priss. She woke up happy and managed to stay happy throughout most of the day. We were supposed to fly out of Danang at 6 pm to head to HCMC. When we got to the airport at 4:15, we are told our flight is delayed until 8:30. YUCK. That means we are stuck in the Danang airport (which is very very small) for 4 hours. Also, we are going to be getting the babies WAY off of their normal schedules. Lucy has gone to bed around 8 every night and it has worked wonderfully.

She started to get antsy by the end of our wait. I was trying to hold out on her next bottle for take off. By the way, she is already eating a whole lot more. We even got a 4 oz. bottle down her yesterday. Anyway, we managed to make it to takeoff with only a little bit of bottle left, but she was fine. By this time it is 9, I am thinking she is going to take the bottle and pass out. Wrong. She was totally wired for the whole flight. This was fine since she was in a really great mood. She did so well the whole flight, which was only 1 hour. I was a proud momma. By the time we got the luggage and in the cab, she was out for the count. She was so tired she didn't stir a bit as we jostled her around moving our stuff and getting in and out of the car. We brought her up to the room, laid her down, and that was it.

In case you were wondering, she is sleeping with us right now. I think it is wonderful for her bonding with us and she needs it anyway. She is an extremely restless sleeper. She has been waking her self up many times in the night by kicking her legs and thrashing her arms around. With us right next to her, we just jiggle her little legs a bit and leave a hand on her and she settles right back down. She did the sweetest thing this morning, I could feel her starting to stir, so I looked over at her. Her eyes were barely open and when I looked at her she gave me a big grin and then reached out her hand for me. To some of you this might not seem like much, but she has not really reached for us at all until yesterday and this morning. It was adorable. One more cute thing about her sleeping while I am on this topic - the day we visited the orphanage, I watched the nanny closely on how she got her to sleep to see if she had any little tricks I should know about. She did this funny little forehead rub with her hair. So, I tried it one night when she was so restless. She was kicking around and I put my hand on her head and rubbed her forehead. She was sleeping, just not soundly at this point. As soon as I started rubbing, she started smiling in her sleep. It was like the good ole days to her.

Right now it is morning here. We are still really tired from last night, but she is up and at em. She is currently playing with her favorite toy, the wipes container. Figures. I just had to take a break to get her a bottle, but dad is giving it to her so I can finish writing this. She really is just a wonderful baby. What a joy.

As far as her development goes, I think she is right on track. She has wonderful head control, she rolls everywhere, she can scoot places that she thinks she needs to go, she is great on her tummy, she reaches and holds toys well, etc. She has a hard time being held sometimes. It is almost like she isn't sure about being held so much. I have found a position that she really seems to enjoy though, so we are doing better with that.

Any time we are out and about, we cause quite the commotion. Everyone wants to look at her, hold her and ask about her. I honestly don't have a problem with the people wanting to hold her. I thought that I would, but I don't. She really enjoys it and I feel like she needs to get as much of her culture as possible while we are here. The Vietnamese people LOVE babies. They all pass them around and cluck at them and she enjoys it. I know it isn't hurting her, so I just let her enjoy it. We will see how that goes when we get in the busy HCMC markets.

Okay, she is antsy and it is time for our breakfast. I will get more pictures up later today. Love to you all from Justin, Kelly, and Lucy. By the way, she is the boss of us all now. I used to get to be the boss, but now we do it all according to her!!

OH MY GOODNESS, IT IS WORKING!!!

HI!!!!!!!!!! I have been DYING, and I do mean dying, to get on here and be able to update you all myself. It has killed me that the internet has been down. I hope that I can get this posted without any problems. I have so much to say, so this is going to be a long one. It is 8:45 pm here and Justin and Lucy are both fast asleep. I was praying that this would work, and looky here, it appears to be!! Thank you all so much for the wonderful comments. I finally got to check my email today and read every single one of them. They made me cry. I am going to make a list of the things i have wanted to say and about some of the things you all have commented about.

1. The Visit to the Orphanage - On the 27th, we got to go to Lucy's orphanage. It was a 1.5 hour drive from Danang. Half of the road was on country roads and I seriously thought that the wheels were going to fall off of our van. The drive there felt like a million hours. We finally get to Que Son and see the orphanage. None of us knew a thing about the orphanage going into this, so it was all new. First of all, it is a very small orphanage - 7 babies total and 2 of them were brand spanking new. One got there that morning. I know one of the little bitties was a boy, but am not sure of the other one. We walk up to the orphanage and standing in the doorway is one of the nannies holding Grace, Sherri's baby girl - who by the way is absolutely adorable and a wonderful baby. I love me some Gracie Girl. We are all squealing about seeing Grace. We get to the entrance, and on a little bed is the main nanny holding Lucy. I was seriously speechless when I saw her through the window. She had on a red hoody, no pants, and a diaper. She couldn't have looked any cuter. The nanny was hesitant to hand her over, but she finally did. Holding her for the first time is something that I cannot put into words, it was simply amazing. She just let us hold her and she stared at us. She watched everything so intently. After a few minutes, the nanny came and took her back from me. She walked outside with her and was crying and kissing on her. It was almost too much for me to process emotionally. It was heart wrenching. The babies in Que Son are so loved and adored by the nannies. I felt so calm and reassured about the first 5 months of Lucy's life. She has had it great. The nanny finally handed her back over and I just held her and cried because I was so emotional about the love that the nanny had for her. We got to stay at the orphanage for about 2 hours. In the 2 hours we were there, Lucy was fed 3 times. That's right folks, 3 times in 2 hours. It was crazy. She would eat about three sucks of each bottle, but any time any of the babies would make a peep, they would put a bottle in their mouth. The 5 older babies were each in a cradle. I would give anything for a cradle at this point. The girl misses the rocking. They would rock the babies so high I thought she was going to fly out, but of course, she never did. We hugged and kissed on those babies for as long as they let us, but then it was time to go. I actually felt good about leaving her for one more night. The nannies still needed to say their goodbyes. She never cried or fussed a bit the whole time we were there - none of the babies did.

2. The Giving and Receiving Ceremony - It was short and to the point. When we pulled up to the city hall in Tam Ky, there is Lucy, bundled in a huge red sweater, a ski/snow hat, pants, and socks that were like hose. Heaven forbid that she got cold in the 85 degree weather. I have to say though, she looked adorable. I was hoping that they would let me keep the clothes that she came in to let her see one day when she is older, and I didn't even have to ask. Changing the babies into a G&R outfit was never even an option. I am so happy about getting to keep her clothes - they smell like women's perfume. I think it is neat that she stayed in her own clothes. It was another emotional overload situation because 2 of her nannies were there and they were all upset again. I had a really difficult time with all of this. After the ceremony, we took care of the babies passports and that was it. Another 1.5 hour drive to get back to the hotel. The babies all did great. She just sat in my lap and took 2 cat naps. No crying at all.

3. Once we were back - We get to the hotel, come up to the room, lay her down on the bed, and come to find out that this girl can move. She rolled all over the place and even laughed for me when I tickled her. We thought that she was just the easiest laid back baby in the world. We stripped her down and let her play naked for a while. She LOVED it!!! Then we thought we would find out what she thought about her bath. She REALLY LOVED the bath. We could not believe how much fun she had in there. All of the babies enjoy their baths, so that is great. We got her changed and went down for dinner. She still has not fussed at this point one little bit. Once we get back to the room, I think it started to hit her that things were different and maybe not going back to normal. She starting crying around 8 and cried solid until 10 or 10:30. She would settle down and then work herself back up. It was so hard to see. We just held her and let her cry. She would barely eat a thing. Once she got to sleep, she slept pretty well. Each day she seems to mourn a little less, but she has definitely had a rough time. She hates to be bored in the room. She will play for about 20-30 minutes, and then she is done. We have to keep her moving around. This is getting better each day, but poor little angel, she misses her nanny. I know it is a good sign, but it is heart breaking to witness as a parent. I wish I could make her understand that we love her as much, and more, than her nanny did. She is finally starting to eat a little better. She is a tiny little thing, and a lot of time she just doesn't have time for food. She is just not that interested in it. And the funny thing is, the nannies instructions to me were this exactly: She needs to be fed all day long. She eats all of the time. Don't just feed her 4 or 5 bottles, she needs a whole lot. Well, that is not how she eats for me unfortunately. She is getting to the point where I think she realizes that we are here to stay. She smiles and coos for us. She is very serious a lot of the time though. I have gotten her laughing several times though.

Now I am just going to comment on the fun stuff.

1. The hair - Her hair is beautiful. She has some bald spots in the back, but they will go away. She loves hats, which is great since you saw the hats we have brought!! I got the flower hat on ebay, since several people have asked. We copied off of one of Lucy's friends - Liberty Mai for that one. Sara and Liz, we will take pictures of her in the precious barettes you sent. Don't think I forgot them. The hair she has is pretty thin right now, so I don't know if they will stay yet.

2. The clothes - as my sisters said, she prefers to be naked, but that has not stopped me from trying. Most of the stuff we brought is too big. She fits best in 3 month clothes, and they are even a little big. Most of the stuff I brought is 6 month+. Oh well, she still looks very stylin every day. Her personal favorite look is a diaper and a big hat!! Kate, I know you are lovin the fringe on top!!

3. Eating - she eats about every 3-4 hours. We do a big time happy dance if we can get three oz. down in one sitting, but it is usually more like 2. We know she needs to be eating more, but it is going to take some time. She eats a little more each day. Formula is stinky and gross to me. I have tried to give her a little rice cereal. She thinks it is funny and likes to mostly spit it out and then laugh.

Okay, I know I have rambled on and on, but I have been dying to update you all. We love and miss you all. Thanks to my sissies for the great posts. We greatly appreciate it. Any suggestions on how to get her to eat more are welcome. She was dehydrated when we first got her, but some pedialyte helped her out. Seriously, thanks for the love and support! Y'all are the best. We head to HCMC tomorrow, so pray for more regular internet from here on out. I will post pictures as we go.

NEW PICS OF LUCY!

Hey everybody! We have some new pics of Lucy from Kelly. She was able to upload some to Flicker, so be sure to click on that Flicker icon to the right & watch the slideshow. SHE IS ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS! Movie star beautiful. Ohmigod, we are all dying. Even prettier than we knew she would be! I'm going to post some on here, as well!

I apologize for the spacing on the pics. This is all brand-new for me! What a little angel!

Just IM'd with Kelly

Hi everybody! It's Holly again.

The entire fam just had a big chat with Kelly & Justin over AIM. The Internet is still crazy - they confirmed it is because of the earthquake in Taipei. We are only able to Instant Message with them. They are going to be in Denang until January 1st - when they leave for Ho Chi Minh City. I'm sorry if I spell any of this wrong! Apparently, Lucy is not crazy about the hotel room, and she does much better when they are up & about. They bought an umbrella stroller, and she loves strolling around the hotel. Unfortunately, the weather has been terrible, so they haven't been able to do much outside...no trips to the beach or into town. Kelly said they were hoping to get to go into town today. They just ate breakfast & were talking to us from the lobby. Lucy had just fallen asleep in the stroller! So cute.

This is going to be kind of rambling, but I want to fill everyone in on all that she told us. Kelly told us that she thinks Lucy is having the hardest time adjusting out of the four babies in their group (one other girl & one boy came from the same orphanage as Lucy; I'm not sure where the other is from). They really think it is because she is so attached to her caregiver. Their first night, Lucy cried for two hours straight, but then she slept for six hours straight...which I thought was really good! She hates the metal crib in the room, and she is sleeping in the bed with Kelly & Justin. Kelly said she slept much better the second night & got lots of sleep. She was dehydrated at first, as well, and she wasn't wanting to take her bottle, but she is already doing much better with that. They gave her some of the kaoelectrolyte drink, and Lucy loved that...and since then, she's been taking her bottle every 3-4 hours. Kelly said Lucy took a bottle at 8 last night, was asleep by 9, took another bottle at midnight & at 4...and then slept until 6:30. They thought that was great!

As we all know, Lucy has more clothes in her closet than I probably do...so I asked her about how many outfits she has worn. This is the funny part - Kelly said that Lucy prefers to be naked, so whenever they are in their hotel room, they let her play in her diaper! She said it figures since she has so many clothes! So, not that many outfit changes! She says that a lot of the clothes they brought are too big, and the three-month outfits fit the best. They do say that she likes all of the hats she has been wearing. Her hair is longer & still the cute mushroom!!!!! Kelly said her hair was crazy & so cute! Lucy has been smiling and cooing at Kelly & Justin, but they say she has also been really fussy - missing her nanny a lot. No bows yet - but she thinks they will try a barrette today!

Kelly also said she thinks Lucy will totally be a daddy's girl. She said she loves Justin so much and that his whiskers don't even bother her. He walks her all around the hotel, and she just loves it!

One last thing...we asked about the G&R ceremony. I'm just going to paste in what she said about it: "The G&R was really quick and over before we knew it. They told us to take good care of the babies and always teach them about Vietnam, etc. Then they called each family up one at a time and handed you the baby and that was it. We cried because the nanny was there and she was crying her head off. She kept taking the babies back and loving on them. It was seriously heart breaking." This nanny seriously breaks my heart; what an amazing woman!

They haven't tried to speak any Vietnamese yet, because she said it is so hard. Everyone at their hotel pretty much speaks English.

Okay, I think that is all I have to report. Just wanted to keep everyone informed. I told her how everyone was going crazy for an update, and she wants me to keep updating for y'all! She sends her love to everyone! She really sounds so happy! OF COURSE!

Update from Kelly's Sister

Hi everybody! This is Holly & Amy - two of Kelly's sisters. The Internet is currently down at her hotel in Vietnam, so she asked us to post an update to her blog. She doesn't think she will have Internet access until the 1st of January.

THEY HAVE LUCY!!!!!!! She is perfect in every way. Here are a few details that we thought would be fun to share.

Kelly & Justin went to the orphanage on the 27th. They weren't sure what to expect, but it was a very small orphanage...only 7 babies! And, they had three amazing caretakers. The caretakers were hesitant to let Kelly & Justin hold Lucy at first, because they are so attached to their precious charges. They finally did let them hold her, and Kelly said it was amazing. Kelly said she didn't even cry. I think she was just overwhelmed with joy! She said they got some wonderful video. Kelly & Justin had received a picture of Lucy with one of her caretakers, and she looks so kind - this caretaker is particularly attached to Lucy. She took Lucy outside & completely broke down & wept. Kelly said she & Justin totally lost it when they saw this happen. She obviously loves Lucy so much, and she is going to miss her. This really touched me, because it meant Lucy has been getting awesome care from people that really love her. I can only imagine how hard it would be to care for these precious babies every day & then have to give them up. There are two other couples in Kelly's group, so three of the seven babies are already adopted! This day was just a visit, and Kelly said it was very hard to leave Lucy after they met her.

The next day they met Lucy at the courthouse for the Giving & Receiving Ceremony. After that, Lucy got to stay with them! I don't have many details about this, but Kelly said that Lucy did great on the bumpy ride back to Denang (1.5 hours!).

Some fun tidbits:
Lucy is rolling all over the place! She seems to be right on track developmentally!
Kelly said she wished she had a cradle, because Lucy & her fellow friends at the orphanage all slept in cradles & loved to rock.
Lucy loved her bath! Kelly said she was splashing & kicking all over!
Lucy has a bit of a runny nose, so they were giving her some medicine for that.
Kelly said that the orphanage had Lucy dressed in a long-sleeve shirt & a red sweater with a hood, so she was very hot! It's in the 80's, so she was sweltering!
They put some PJ"s with legs on Lucy, and Kelly said Lucy wasn't sure what to think about that, because she's never had anything on her legs.
They say Lucy is still little, but a very healthy five months. Kelly is guessing she's around 14 pounds!
Also, they have gotten some good smiles out of her already! Lucy's claim to fame at the orphanage was that she was the "laid back" one. How precious is that?!?!?!

Basically, everything is going great! Kelly & Justin sound great! We are interested to hear how their first night went with the baby. We'll update more as we hear from them. They are just so happy to have their little girl!!!!!